Alexander Sacal is a legend. Before the matchup even began, he was the moral victor, erasing Adam Prosak’s blunder of picking the wobbly table by fixing it with a wink to Pro Circuit photographer Craig Gibson. Prosak can legitimately be described as a bit of a legend also, having won two $10K events and finished in the Top 8 of Pro Circuit Amsterdam. He’s here today with his trademark Titans deck, which is versatile and powerful enough to let him outplay opponents as necessary with his immense skill at the game.
Prosak had the initiative and led off with an Optitron activation to fetch Terra. Sacal had no recruits. On his initiative, nothing changed. Prosak meanwhile used his Tron again and played Pantha. For turn 3, Prosak had Beast Boy, while Sacal was still without recruits.
“Who misses their drops?” remarked Sacal with a wry smile. Prosak simply pointed right at him and continued the beatdown.
Turn 4 saw the very first recruit from Sacal, who played a Sentinel Mark V and used Search and Destroy on the Boy, flipping Total Anarchy. Prosak responded with a Finishing Move on the robot and then revealed a very gassy hand. A Flame Trap wiped out his entire board, and going into turn 5, the board was empty.
Cassie Sandsmark ◊ Wonder Girl was the play for turn 5 from Prosak, while Sacal used a Reconstruction Program for three copies of Sentinel Mark V and boosted one out. After a short fight, the board was again cleared by Prosak.
For turn 6, Sacal played a boosted Mark V and Boliver Trask for another one.
“Is this the worst Sentinels draw ever?” asked a spectator from the crowd in the bleachers. Cries of “Yes!” came from all directions.
Prosak used Optitron to find Garth ◊ Tempest, then used USS Argus and passed. Boliver well and truly got his beat on, attacking Cassie Sandsmark with some help from two Savage Beatdowns to get the stun. Sentinel Mark V then beat up Garth to make a game of it. Adam returned Beast Boy before Garth got stunned, and it was on to turn 7.
Adam used Optitron to fetch Koriand’r ◊ Starfire and pointed out that everyone seems to leave their guys in the back row on turn 7 against his Titans. Any $10K wins from that?
Sacal popped a Genosha after generating resource points, dug for Magneto, Master of Magnetism, and declared how hard his turn was. The big mutant was not forthcoming. He played Boliver Trask, fetching another Sentinel Mark V, and then played his Bastion. Koriand’r shot down the back row Sentinel Mark V before Adam looked to make attacks. Garth ◊ Tempest didn’t fancy his chances against a big scary Bastion, and instead went in for value against Boliver Trask.
Sacal went into the tank, looking at his opponent’s KO’d pile.
“Do you have a Tamaran face down?” probed Sacal
“There’s one way to find out . . .”
“You could just tell me.”
“Okay, two ways. But one of them isn’t going to work.”
Sacal let his Boliver die and chose to pass his attacks. It was only in the recovery phase that he realized he could have formed up his Sentinel Mark V that was stunned by Koriand’r after it got stunned. It looked as though it was marked for death again.
On turn 8, Sacal played out a Nimrod and no resource, and again Prosak’s 6-drop activated to stun the boosted 4-drop.
“Wouldn’t it be great if I had formed up like that to keep your 6-drop exhausted?” suggested Sacal with a cheeky grin.
Prosak had Red Star; Tim Drake ◊ Robin, Young Detective; and Pantha for his team, along with the extra point with which to burn his opponent. A Flame Trap from Sacal cleared much of this new board for Prosak, but with the endurance totals at 23 to 5 in Adam’s favor, it looked likely not to be a huge issue.
Nimrod attacked Red Star, who was hiding behind Koriand’r, and Sacal tried to find a way to get in some breakthrough. He knew from his early Search and Destroy that Prosak had a Heroic Sacrifice, and with Garth ◊ Tempest on the board, that threat was effectively doubled. Sacal pumped his Nimrod once, and Adam simply allowed his Russian Titan to become stunned, reinforcing for value. Sacal then went all-in with his Bastion with pumps and a Savage Beatdown to force the Heroic Sacrifice.
Prosak generated 9 resource points and used two consecutive USS Argus activations to get a busty hand for what would be the final turn. With Garth and Koriand’r on the board already, he used Optitron to fetch Roy Harper ◊ Arsenal, Sharpshooter. Roy came out to play and was joined by a boosted Tim Drake ◊ Robin. Sacal had his Magneto, Master of Magnetism, but things looked bleak for him.
Prosak went into Magneto with everyone, then starting using Teen Titans Go! to brutal effect; he readied his team enough to stun each and every character on Sacal’s board. Without a board, Alex was forced to extend his hand.
Adam Prosak wins.